Bryce Harper is in a slump. Not a daily, weekly, or monthly slump, but a slump that has been going on since the beginning of May — nearly two months. Coming off a breakout season in 2015, Harper seemed poised to be even better this year. In April he had a .714 slugging percentage, a 1.121 OPS, and a 181 wRC+ (creates 81% more runs than the average hitter). No pitcher wanted to pitch to him. On a day during the first week of May, Harper went 0-0, with six walks and one hit-by-pitch. Since then, it seems like walking is the only thing he’s done well. In May, he hit .200/.363/.785 with a 105 wRC+. In June, he’s hit .262/.369/.720 with a 95 wRC+(though he did post OBPs of .422 and .351 in May and June, respectively). In essence, Harper has produced like an average major-league hitter over the last two months. The only problem with that is that Harper is widely regarded as not an average MLB hitter, but one of the best (if not the best) hitters in all of baseball.

Sure, hitters go into slumps all the time. It’s no reason to get worked up about a bad spell here and there. Remember, baseball is a game where a hitter fails 70% of the time and is considered a Hall-of-Famer. There are going to be 0-4 days.

But two months seems like an awfully long time. And it’s my job here to find out why. So let’s take a look.

The first thing that stands out when examining Harper under the microscope of a computer is his batting average on balls in play (BABIP). He’s hitting .257 in said category — well below his career average of .323 and well below the 2016 MLB average of .300. BABIP does reflect the ability of the hitter, but it also depends significantly on defense and luck. A batter whose BABIP is well below his career and league average may just be getting unlucky — whether that is from hitting the ball directly at defenders or defenders making spectacular plays.

So, is Harper hitting the ball with the same authority he did last year (which would confirm the idea that he’s getting unlucky)? Not quite. In the following table you can see that the number of line drives he’s hit (LD%) is down 7% and number of balls he’s hit softly (Soft%) is up 12%. He’s hitting fewer line drives and more fly balls (FB%) — but those fly balls aren’t turning into home runs, as his HR/FB% is down from 27% to 17% (i.e. last year for every 100 fly balls that Harper hit, 27 of those were home runs. This year he’s hitting 17 home runs for every 100 fly balls).

So, Harper is hitting more soft fly balls that are getting caught by outfielders, and fewer line drive that find gaps. Could this be a result of his discipline at the plate — his ability to differentiate strikes from balls and to swing accordingly? There are two things I want you to look at: Z-Swing% and O-Contact%. They sound confusing but they’re simple to understand. Z-Swing% is the percentage of strikes the batter swings at. O-Contact% is the percentage of balls outside the strike zone that the batter makes contact with.

You can see the difference between last year and this year. Harper is swinging at fewer strikes (5% less) and making contact with more balls outside the strike zone (5% more). That would explain why he’s hit more balls softly this year — he’s making weak contact with pitches outsize the zone. It’s much harder for a batter to hit a ball well outside the zone because it’s farther away from him. You can see the truth in this statement from the following graph (all qualified hitters from 2012-2016).

The graph shows the relationship between isolated power (ability to hit for extra bases) and O-Contact%. It’s pretty clear that the more often a batter makes contact with a ball out of the zone, the less likely that ball with result in a double, triple, or home run. In 2016, Harper is somewhere right smack in the middle of all the dots (0.65 O-Contact%, .225 ISO).

Before I end, I just want to make it clear that Harper isn’t by any means a bad player. He’s a superstar, an All-Star, and probably the face of MLB — oh, and he’s 23. But, for lack of a better term, he’s performed like an average player the majority of this season, so I set out to find why. I think it’s mostly due to being unlucky with his deflated BABIP, but I’d also be cognizant of plate discipline if I were him. Pitchers do try to pitch around hm — just being a little more patient and swinging at more strikes and fewer balls wouldn’t hurt.

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Your “triple slash” in the first paragraph is batting average/ slugging pct. / OPS, which seems strange. I get that you are making an argument around his walk rate, but since your conclusion rests on a claim that a slightly higher o-zone hit pct. is evidence of a decline in approach, the walk rate is important. It’s also notable that his o-zone swinging rate has not increased, which works against your narrative, although there is something going on.

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Ah yes, thanks for pointing that out– must have slipped by me. And to your o-zone swing% point– I did notice that but, at that point, was so far “in” to the analysis that I bit my tongue and decided not to bring it up (which probably isn’t the best mindset to have, but alas).

I suppose you could say that Harper’s had-eye coordination is so good that he’s too “good” at making contact with balls outside the zone– for he may be better off swinging-and-missing at those entirely.

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Good article jclarke. Well stated.

I know this is slightly off topic, but I’m looking for some help on how to submit an article that includes either pictures, data tables or embedded Tableau graphs. I literally can’t find anything on the site or online that tells you how to do this. I’m curious how you were able to include your data tables and the scatter plot? Do you care to help out? It would be greatly appreciated!! Again, great article!

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Thanks!

Actually mine are just screenshots from fangraphs and excel. There should be a button to attach media somewhere on that toolbar above the text.

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Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. For some reason, the “Add Media” button is not available to me within Word Press. When I try to add media through “Press It”, I get an error message saying I do not have permission to Upload. So clearly it’s a permissions issue. I’ve looked all over the site for a way to contact a support function but I don’t think anything exists. I’d really like to submit some articles so this is a bit frustrating. Do you have any suggestions who/how I can contact to obtain some site support?… Read more »

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Tried that link, no response. I contacted one of the editors via Twitter and he kindly mentioned imgur having worked for some people. I think that may work. I will also look into what you suggested. I sincerely thank you for taking the time to respond and offering your help. Keep up the good work.